For Family
by ShivaVixen
Summary: "My family is my strength and my weakness." Aishwarya Rai. How far would you go for family when all is said and done? Would you fight until your last breath? Would you admit defeat? Would you sacrifice your life or theirs? Into Darkness Spoilers, read at your own risk.
1. Khan

**I may be coming back to this fandom, it helps that Into Darkness was so epic.**

**Just a simple stand alone oneshot to start, so there are spoilers- it's a minor deleted scene/what-if.**

He stays completely still as he comes back to conciousness, and partially revises his opinion of the Vulcan. The alien would break a bone, and if pushed he could break several.

He can feel the restraints holding him down, unfortunately, while he is better at everything, it would take him a while to escape the unfamiliar restraints, and he'd probably trip an alert and end up drugged before he can take his revenge.

He drags up memories of what happened, the loss of his crew- damn that Vulcan, he lied- his attempts at running to fight again another day, and the stubborn alien that had chased him, and had even sent him such strong, almost crippling emotions underneath the disorienting mental attack.

The woman that beamed down, the lieutenant who slipped and revealed her captain's identity, had tried stunning him, and the alien's subsequent attack- far more brutal than his captain's, and far more effective- left him dazed. She had yelled something, something about Kirk.

He can hear the grumbling of the doctor, and warily cracks open an eye. There's a machine, taking his blood, and he gets a quick glimpse of an all too still figure. He quickly closes his eye as he hears a door hiss open.

"Doctor, what is the Captain's status?" The Vulcan asks, and Khan begins to plan his death.

"He's alive when he should be dead, it'll take time to see the effects . . . He was severely irradiated after fixing the core."

Core . . . Did Kirk actually go into the warp core to stop his ship from falling? Khan's reluctant respect (Because Kirk would do anything for his crew, because Kirk knew not to trust him when even Marcus had foolishly thought that unfreezing Khan had given him the right to order him around, because Kirk wouldn't have killed Khan's crew like the Vulcan had) goes up a notch.

"And Khan and his crew?"

The question almost makes him jolt, demand answers.

His crew . . . still alive?

"Once this transfer is complete, I'll put Khan in a deeper coma- the cryo-pods are all stable, not even badly jarred." The two talk a little longer, and Khan gives in to temptation and cracks open his other eye, spotting the pods- all of them. His control slips and he opens both eyes to stare at the pods, intact, not blown up.

Alive.

"You're awake." The Vulcan notices and the Doctor swears.

"You didn't kill them." Khan is too tired, too relieved, to engage the other in a mind game. "Why?"

Because as agonizing as it had been, first having his crew held as collateral, then used against him, it had been an effective strategy- He had made mistakes, many mistakes, the least being not blowing up the Enterprise.

"I believe the Captain would say, because we are not like you." The alien's response is cold, detached. The Doctor hovers in the background.

"You said you didn't lie."

"I said the torpedoes were yours, you assumed your crew was still in them." Khan wants to laugh, because both Vulcan and Human have managed to defeat him and it has been so long since he's had a worthy opponent . . . admitting defeat isn't even painful because his crew is alive.

"What will happen to them?"

"They will remain frozen. From what I understand from the admirality, John Harrison will be listed as killed, and if you cooperate, you will be frozen as well."

It's the only option, really, John Harrison did die, and Khan has no intention of ever obeying Starfleet again, and he's not so sure their prisons would hold him for long, or whatever 'humane' method of death- if his blood is being used to bring Kirk back from death- would even kill him.

"You have my permission to use my blood to save your captain. It worked on a little girl in a coma." He hear's the doctor's hiss and the Vulcan seems to stiffen. He's done talking, and turns to focus back on his crew.

It's a fair trade, he thinks days later, as he is injected with the nessecary drugs to survive being frozen, the Captain of the Enterprise for his crew.

**Might do a couple more chapters with different characters . . . Spock and McCoy definitely, Dr. Marcus, Scotty and Kirk maybe. Might even do a second drabble on Khan at somepoint.**

**Short of an explosion, I don't think there's much that could kill Khan, and I imagine that strapping a bomb to someone to execute them in the future would be highly frowned upon. It's frowned upon now, on that note.**


	2. Spock

**And here is Spock . . . There is a lack of Spock/Uhura and it's not because I ship Kirk/Spock instead, but because I honestly like Uhura as a strong single woman. Seriously, watch the original Uhura, she's awesome (as long as there's no executive meddling, Undiscovered Country wasn't the best showing of her).**

Logic used to be the only sure thing in his life. He was half Vulcan, half human, his place in the universe always seemed uncertain at best.

Then Nero came and destroyed Vulcan, taking away a part of his family. He felt bonds start to develop between himself and his rash reckless captain (who had managed to get closer than anyone in such a short period of time) and slowly the rest of the crew followed; he began to feel like he had. . . added to his family. (The loyalty is not something he's familiar with, the promise of going down together is so illogical . . . And yet, a part of him appreciated it.)

Intuition is not something he normally subscribes to, but the moment Scott had called, he had known something had happened, something potentially irrepairable.

He's not sure why Jim's death affected him so deeply, and then he realizes that once again, he had a vital member of his family in danger just out of his reach, and he could do nothing to save them.

Logically, he knows (knew) nothing could have been done, opening the door to pull Jim out would have put others at risk, but (as with his mother's death) his mind refuses to stop running different calculations and possibilities.

At great cost. The words his alternate used, and he feels as if the other had understated.

To think that Jim's life was greater than anyone else's was a logical fallacy, and yet, Spock had been enraged to the point his control shattered, and he had gone after Khan with the intent to kill.

Uhura's appearance on the barge put her in danger, and the few thoughts he does have runs the line of 'Another family member in danger, take out threat'. And he does, brutally, some effciency lost.

And then, hope, Uhura shouting that Khan was nessecary to save Kirk, to bring Jim back . . .

He's still not sure what to make of the way his control slipped. The way his world narrowed to _Jim is dead, Khan must pay_ it frightens him even now, so similar to the rage that he had felt towards Nero after the loss of his mother.

But he does understand that logically, taking out a threat to one's family is the most logical course of action. Doing everything possible to keep family with you is also logical, which is probably why he finds he has no objection to the (slightly illegal, but as a vulcan, he is aware of technicalities and will protect the doctor from any fallout) use of Khan's blood to bring back Jim. The moment when Jim's heart starts to beat, faint, slow, and almost imperceptible, is the moment he begins to gain back his badly shaken control.

He has a crew and a ship to get in order, so that their captain can once more take the chair.

**. . . Spock is difficult to write, especially after a year not writing him . . . McCoy is going to be next, I think.**


	3. McCoy

**McCoy up . . . **

Losing family is the worst thing McCoy can dream of, some of his worst nightmares involve coming home ( his old home, with his ex-wife and him still married) and either his baby girl running away from him, or no one there (the empty house is the better nightmare).

The divorce and loss of his daughter almost destroyed him. Would have, if he hadn't gotten an offer from Starfleet, and a rather annoying pain in the neck hadn't saddled him with the nickname of 'Bones' and promptly become his number one patient.

Jim wasn't perfect, the man was reckless one minute, cold brutal efficiency the next, all covered with a megawatt smile, but he was a loyal friend.

Of all the deaths, curteosy of Marcus and Khan, Jim's hit him the hardest. Radiation exposure, over 200 years and there was no cure for such high exposure. Tissue would begin to break down internally, microscopically, until the effect would cascade into multiple organ failure. Once the tissue was irradiated there was no way to stop it.

The tribble (dead, poisoned, had been dead for months) started to purr and move.

_No such thing as a no-win scenario._

It's morally questionable, potentially illegal, but McCoy doesn't give a damn as he bellows for a cryo-pod, because there is still a chance to save his family.

He hesitates once, as he's drawing blood from (war-criminal, prisoner) Khan.

"This is potentially illegal, immoral." What gives him the right to play God?

"So is letting a man die when you have the chance to save him, Doctor." It's the logical hobgoblin that responds, Dr. Marcus is silent, pale, starting the necessary IVs. "I will deal with the technicalities."

McCoy doesn't (can't) look at the other, and turns his full focus to Jim.

He's risking his license, his morals on a gamble, he knows Spock is risking his rank and career.

All for a friend who is as close as family . . . And who would violate any law for a friend.

**Again, might come back to McCoy, later.**

**The nightmare McCoy mentions actually happened to someone I know- he was a pilot for an airline, and got moved from one city to another, so he rented a small apartment in the new city, and planned to live there while on call and returned home to his wife and child whenever he could. For the first couple of weeks or so, it was fine, but then he came home and his daughter shied away from him, scared because she didn't recognize him. He was really hurt by that.**

**He solved the problem by taking a job as a flight instructor and moving his family with him.**

**He's a lot like McCoy in a lot of ways.**

**If anyone has a request for a character, let me know, I'm open for suggestions.**


	4. Kirk

**Jim's turn, but far different from the other fics about the warp core scene, I promise**.

_Dying is easy._

It's the oddest thought to have, as he's trying to crawl his way back to the door, and feeling a strange burning pain that is almost to the point of freezing despite being so hot- it's an entirely new level of pain, that he's never before experienced.

It's so bad, that he almost wants to stop moving, lay down, and just let the darkness he knows is coming take him. Almost, but no where near enough.

_But it would be so easy to die right now._

Dying is easy, he thinks as he takes another _burningchoking_ breath, because it's so final. Once you die, that's it. You've finished and you don't have to deal with the consequences, like worried and grieving loved ones, how long you'll take to fully recover, worries that you won't fully recover, nightmares and just frustrating day to day life.

He used to flirt with death, he knows, dancing near the edge, doing everything in his power to get as close as he could, before pulling away.

He's mellowed somewhat, but . . . He's never had the same reaction to death and danger that everyone else does. The Kobayashi Maru never frightened him. He knew full well it was a similation, didn't even come close to real life, _blasters firing as soldiers followed orders to kill innocent people knowing in just a moment, the blast would find him if he didn't get away, _and all of life's real emotions.

_There was no unwinnable situation, even if the solution was the death of someone or something._

Maybe he had gotten so used to cheating, he had forgotten that some times, you could win by following the rules, despite the consequences.

He's almost at the clear door, can see his chief engineer standing there, almost as if begging him to keep moving.

He feels incredibly guilty, because no matter how anyone looked at it, he had screwed up, put the only thing that ever felt like family, his crew, into danger. Too much danger. He had been blind, reckless. He had hurt the ones he cared about. He hadn't been there for Pike when he died, he had alienated his chief engineer, even though Scotty had come back there were . . . too many straws, Spock and Bones had tried to warn him (and absently, he made the mental note that next time the two agreed, he would listen, despite knowing that there wouldn't _be_ a next time), he'd probably put too much stress on Uhura, Chekov and Sulu . . . And he'd put all of them in harm's way.

His chest feels strange, and it's not the pain, but fear and regret that are choking him as he finally reaches the other door, and rests against it for a moment before closing the hatch leading directly to the core.

He's scared of dying, he realizes in a strange sense of deja vu, scared because he doesn't want to die, he wants to live, stay with his crew, _no, his family_, and live with them again.

But it's too late, because as he speaks with Spock, he feels a strange numbness spreading through, so he tries to hold on, because he doesn't want to die alone, unable to touch someone, anyone . . . But time is up, and his body quits, surrendering to _burningfreezingnumbness_ that takes him, and everything goes dark.

And yet a part of him stills clings to the thoughts and memories, and the strange stray thought that even if he couldn't live, he'd stay . . .

_Because he finally found something worth staying for._

**Yeah, not so much Jim and Spock than Jim and crew- I'm getting a little tired of the Jim and Spock chamber scenes. I've got a second one planned for Jim, but before that, Scotty, and a couple special guests.**

**I avoided the Spock and Kirk cliche, because I already did that in Spock's chapter. This chapter focused on Jim's feelings for the crew as a whole, because he was saving the crew, not just Spock.**


End file.
